THE
WATSONIAN
Vol. 1
MAY, 1927
No. 4
^ ^
ISSUED MONTHLY
15c PER COPY
PUBLISHED BY
Tfie TOM WATSON BOOK COMPANY
THOMSON, GEORGIA
129
THE
WATSONIAN
Vol. 1
MAY, 1927 No. 4
CONTENTS
Frontispiece Thos. E. Watson
Life of Thomas E. Watson
A Survey of the World
The Roman Catholic Hierarchy
Editorial Notes
The Al Smith Letter— An Editorial
Short Talks to Young Men
Break Away From Party Bondage
From the Press
Letters From the People
ISSUED MONTHLY 15c PER COPY
PUBLISHED BY
The TOM WATSON BOOK COMPANY
THOMSON, GEORGIA
130
THE WATSONIAN
SENATOR THOS. E. WATSON
131
LIFE OF THOS. E. WATSON
BY HIS GRAND-DAUGHTER,
GEORGIA WATSON LEE
CHAPTER IV.
STRUGGLES
"Circumstances are like ladders hung before us all — some climb, others do
not."— T. E. W.
Evidently, Mr. Watson was a climber. His fame as a young orator
spread rapidly after his memorable Temperance address at Horse
Creek, and friends assisted him to begin "reading law." Lack of funds
was a serious handicap to this youthful law student — this successful
school teacher — this devoted son. Discouraged at times, jubilant at
others, we find him struggling along, a nineteen-year-old boy in 1875,
turning this way and that, but not being financially able to lay out a
well-defined plan and follow it. Yet, by teaching now and then, and
availing himself of all the opportunities that opened a way for him
to make further progress in the study of law, he soon became con-
vinced that he could pass the bar examination. But his personal
troubles were multiplied for in those reconstruction days the family
had lost the "old home place" and moved to Augusta, where the health
of all was very bad and his father's spirits continued to drift down-
ward. His own words tell how he was grieved : "On going on a short
visit to Augusta, I studied about the altered condition of things until
I was miserable. To see my sisters growing up in such a neighborhood
and such surroundings was deeply mortifying to me. I determined
to lose no time in coming to their relief."
Thus, we get a glimpse of the great altruistic spirit of Mr. Wat-
son. While yet struggling to get himself established as a lawyer, his
soul was burdened for the welfare of his family. This love for family
became more and more intense as the years went by and no grand-
child of any land has more vivid and glorious memories of an honored
grand-parent than I (pardon the personal reference) do of the de-
lightful hours that we — grandfather and grandchild — spent in roam-
132 THE WATSONIAN
ing through the gardens and fields among nature's beauties, which he
loved second only to his family.
But the ambition to become successful in a chosen profession and
bring relief and success to the family circle, whose hardships all had
shared in early childhood's days, is not a virtue peculiar to Mr. Wat-
son alone, for many a youth has had the self -same commendable fire
raging in his breast. The poet aptly said :
One master passion within the breast,
Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up all the rest.
In enumerating Mr. Watson's troubles in these youthful years of
his life, it would be an injustice to the reader, and would ignore the
written record left in Mr. Watson's Scrap Book, should we not give
what he, himself, designates as "silly" love affairs. The intelligent
reader who is safely beyond that wistful, longing, languid, drooping,
woe-be-gone stage of "puppy" love when youth discovers a "queen"
whose
Eyes were as bright as the dewdrop,
Her cheeks as fair as the day;
And her lips were a region of sweetness
Where only a lover should stray.
must know that Mr. Watson's success as a teacher and orator,
together with his promise as a lawyer, were the very things that
would attract the lassies of the land who, in turn, by their wiles and
winsomness would set the nineteen-year-old hero's head all a-flutter
with brainstorms of "puppy" love which must work their course in
the life of every boy. They are just as sure to come as the shedding
of his baby teeth.
Mr. Watson's own account of one or two instances in his youth
will be sufficient to show that he was made of just common dust like
the rest of humanity, subject to the assaults of the puppy love "bug,"
which can be used as a step to a larger and broader outlook for life.
Look again at the quotation from Mr. Watson given at the open-
ing of this chapter. Mr. Watson climbed and conquered.
In the fall of 1876 Glenn Thompson and I hitched up his noble steed, Galus,
and set out on a trip to Augusta. We had planned to keep bachelor's hall, run
a farm and we were going to Augusta to get some furniture and things. Well,
the weather was fine and we were in that jocose mood which can make fun out
LIFE OF THOS. E. WATSON 133
of anything. So it was continual laughter most of the way. I had my fiddle along
and I waked the sylvan echoes with it a good deal.
We remained in Augusta several days. Going back we took things more
quietly.
About this time Glenn and I were living in a little cottage not far from the
main dwelling — keeping Bachelor's Hall. We had a roaring time of it sometimes
and then again it was pensive, for we both had our troubles. At night my fiddle
waked the silence among the pines and Glenn studied his sermons. We planned to
live there during 1877 and were going to buy another place — neither one of us
having a copper in our pockets. Then, I heard of a good school in Tom Andrews'
neighborhood and went down prospecting. The outlook was good for 1877 but in
the meanwhile (Fall of 1876) I had nothing to do. I got morose, moody and
sulky as a mad bull. I used to lie down under the pines and try to imagine
where the dickens I was drifting to, and what awful change had come over the
spirit of my dreams that I was getting so near the bottom. Looking at the
matter in an unprejudiced light it didn't require much wisdom to see that
profligacy was ruining me — these pretty, delightfully naughty girls.
To US, this recognition of his wayward course while under the
entrancing spell of those bewitching eyes, and with nothing to do, was
the uplifting of a noble, courageous spirit, highly commendable in a
youth. After commenting at length, we read:
But it was down hill business. I grew tired of a course in which the more a
brute a man is the more successful he is.
I was determined to "go up and gather lilies." The State Lecturer's place in
the I. O. G. T. was in my reach but the office was abolished. Mr. Pearce* said
he would give me a chance. Riding back home from the station where I had
read his letter the glad, fierce feeling of a new life opening to me rose and
swelled till the woods rang with the whoop that burst from my lips. It was
a glorious feeling and right there did my destiny turn the comer.
Thus, Mr. Watson demonstrated anew that psychological law that
every victory over selfish tendencies gives us renewed strength for
the fray. He recognized, without an obstructing doubt that his
"destiny had turned the corner."
Another of his early love affairs is told at some length. The un-
interesting details are omitted here, but we quote a sufficiency to
show his attitude towards these fine, blooming specimens of God's
greatest piece of handiwork.
*Mr. R. H. Pearce was his old school teacher. This introduces him. We tell more of him
later on.
134 THE WATSONIAN
I fell in love with her and soon we were engaged. She is not what at first
sight one would call a beautiful girl, but upon acquaintance she improves won-
derfully. Hers is a character which requires close scrutiny to discover its beau-
ties. Then, however, it reveals its charms day by day, as the rosebud unfolds its
fragrant petals. Then her blue eye beams with an unwonted lustre and her face,
changing its expression with every emotion that sweeps over her heart, is in
one moment shaded by a veil of sweet sadness, and the next, as radiant with joy
as that of the forgiven Peri. And it is this ever varying expression, the very
mirror of her inmost soul, that gives such a fascination to her face, and gives an
insight into the noble, womanly qualities upon which her character is founded.
Truly, "to know her, is to love her."
This vivid description was the outburst of sentiment flowing from
a soul basking in the noblest thought realms where the low, the
sensual, the diabolical never dare to intrude. This exuberance of
youthful passion was from an individual tuned up to echo back every
chord of the lovely. The response of this spirit to everything beauti-
ful whether it be in face, or thought or character, is like the humming
bird that flies over the valley ignoring the dead, the rotten, the de-
testable, while it gently hovers over the roses and the lilies.
There remains one more outburst of the "puppy" love malady that
we must include in this recounting of his "silly" life incidents. The
object of this affair was Theo Story. His fascination for her began
when he was quite young and ended forever as recorded by him in his
Scrap Book, on Page 140, while boarding at Mr. Thompson's and teach-
ing in Screven County. He wrote:
While I was in a high state of imaginary sorrow over the smash-up between
Theo and me. Although I had never spent half a dozen hours alone in her
company, I believed she was made as especially for me, as if the job had been
done to order. Consequently, I made quite an interesting ass of myself. It's a
fine thing Pro\'idence lets us outgrow such things. I look at her now sometimes
and remembering this affair, ardently wish I had the power to kick myself.
In Mr. Watson's early life when youthful passions raged in his
breast, poetic thoughts possessed him, for he, like many young-
sters, wrote poems. Some of them he, later, classed as "doggerel,"
while others must live as splendid contributions to southern literature.
A born poet is temperamental, highly imaginative, and impresses his
more sedate friends as eccentric and visionary. Oftentimes, these
qualities become less pronounced as the years go by. So it was with
Mr. Watson, for the romantic and passionate receded to the back-
ground in his thought realm and, in their stead, the visions of the re-
LIFE OF THOS. E. WATSON 135
former sprang into full-fledged existence — it was another instance in
which "the youth was father to the man."
I can not forbear giving another page of his Scrap Book entitled
"Visiting a Country Cousin." It is a master piece of vivid description,
and brings, delightfully, within its scope many family and social rela-
tionships, philosophizing on some with the wisdom of a sage. We
conimend it to the young reader as a model in the description of
personal experiences and incidents. Under the above caption he says :
Glad to escape from the noise and dust of the town, I cheerfully accepted
Cousin Lilly's invitation to visit her. A drive of six miles brought me to my
destination. Cousin Lilly, whom I caught napping, did not appear for some
time. Miss Sallie Skinner was in the parlor, besides my aunt, Edna Jones, and
pretty soon there sailed in a middle aged lady who was introduced to me as Miss
Peck. Her bow to me was so small that I vaguely felt the want of a micro-
scope. She seemed so much bent on crushing me by her queenly demeanor, that I
let her earnestly alone. Presently Cousin Lilly came in, and after some general
conversation we opened the piano and commenced practicing together, she play-
ing on the piano and I accompanying her on the violin. After performing two
or three pieces with tolerable success, we got into difficulties. Then to my sur-
prise. Miss Peck began to help us out. All her stiffness vanished at once and she
became a most pleasant companion. When I put away the violin she played and
sang for us and even selected one or two pieces which she said I must learn
for the fiddle. Her singing was very good. Among other things she sang "The
Haunted Stream." The burden of it seemed to be a prayer from a lover for
his sweetheart to meet him by the haunted stream, though the song did not
explain why he wished her, so particularly, to meet him in that disagreeable
place.
My visit was most pleasant, for the whole female sex can not boast a more
agreeable member than Cousin Lilly Jones. We played together, talked together,
sang together and told our secrets. At night we would sit on the piazza, fanned
by the cool breeze, and admire the trembling stars, while I told her the pretty
stories which mythology had woven round them. And coming away from the
loves of the ancients we came down to those of a very modern date indeed. The
hours flew by on noiseless wings and when I retired to my i-oom the song of the
whip-poor-will was a welcome serenade. Cousin Lilly is the queen of all
cousins. In fact, if I were to stay with her long, I have a strong conviction that
another name would be added to the list of my lady loves.
See what a bouquet of thoughts enter into the description above !
The apparent haughty conduct of Miss Peck, by association and a sub-
ject of common interest, is soon transformed into a "most pleasant"
companionship. He touches on mythology, astronomy, ancient lovers
and modern lovers ; you almost feel the cooling breezes and all but hear
the love note of the whip-poor-will ; he shows how youthful intimacy
136 THE WATSONIAN
discloses secrets "but don't you tell" modestly showing the luxury of
this post-bellum home by referring to the piano and the high-toned
guests, and closes with an outburst of admiration for the "queen" of
cousins.
Let the student of today try his hand on descriptive narrative
and compare results.
From a newspaper clipping in his Scrap Book we learn that Mr.
Watson was no "sissy," but a real red-blooded youngster whose
promise as a ball player led to his selection as captain and pitcher for
his team, which bore the significant name of the "Up And At 'Ems,"
who defeated the "Wild Catchers" by a score of 41 to 21. While the
score shows an overwhelming defeat for the "Wild Catchers" and a
glorious victory for the "Up And At 'Ems," we are sure that the name
of the winning team conveys a much deeper meaning to those who
are familiar with the aggressiveness of Mr. Watson, the orator, the
editor and the statesman. Perhaps no other name would have so well
forecasted the future career of the "Sage of McDuffie."
At Augusta in the fall of 1876, Mr. Watson, Thomas E. Watson*
was admitted to the bar, going immediately to Sylvania in Screven
County where the Superior Court was in session, and earned his first
fee by drawing up a legal paper and securing the court order.
Mr. Watson then began practice at Marland's Mill, but things
grew dull and he was forced to turn to teaching again to make ends
meet. His second school for that season and the last school he ever
taught was in the Coil neighborhood where he boarded with Homer
Coil, Esq. After this school closed Mr. Watson went back to Thomson
to take advantage of the kindness of his old teacher, Mr. Pearce. To
understand his gratitude you must read his words. Here they are:
Back to Thomson! What strange tricks life has played with me since I left —
now a collegian, now a school teacher, now a lawyer, battling always with poverty.
I hardly know how I came to think of returning here at the particular time I did,
*Mr. Watson's name given by his parents was Edward Thomas Watson. As Edward T. Wat-
son he was known in school and in college. Mr. Watson discovered that Thomas E. Watson is
much more euphoneous than Edward T. Watson. Consequently, he decided upon the change
which was made with the consent of his mother.
LIFE OF THOS. E. WATSON 137
but I think it was a mere sudden impulse. I had got tired of the humdrum life
of a school teacher, tired of living with people who did not understand me, and
I wrote to Mr. R. H. Pearce, one of my old teachers, to know if he would take
me into his family and give me a chance to see what I could do. He responded
nobly and I came at once and commenced the practice of my profession. I was
received with a kindness that touched my heart, and I turned a new page in
the book of my life.
My office, at the Court House with Mr. Pearce, looks out upon the old play-
ground of my boyhood days; and here in sight of my old home, here amid the
holiest associations memory cherishes I intended to make the final fight and, God
willing, win my laurels.
My practice so far has been good, yielding me $101.70 in cash. I have met
single handed every member of the Bar, and have no reason to complain of the
result.
I have been under many obligations to Mr. J. E. White since my return and
can never sufficiently thank him. He has associated me in the Editorship of The
Journal, and this I think has been of great benefit to me. When he went to
Florida he left me in charge and I ran the paper almost entirely until his re-
turn. Then I withdrew entirely to give all my time to the study of my pro-
fession. The position I held on The Journal was a most pleasant one. I believe
a man can come very near to happiness editing a thrifty little country news-
paper.
Now we pick up again the threads of our story. The quotation
just given recalls the time when he decided to write Mr. Pearce and
his "destiny turned a corner," and we catch up again the thread that
tells how miserable he was when he thought of the poverty and dis-
tress of his family in Augusta.
With the money cleared the first year from his practice, Mr. Wat-
son made the first payment on the "old home place," which, together
with other property, had been lost in those hard reconstruction days,
and for which Mr. Watson had bargained on the installment plan.
This was a beautiful old country estate, comfortable house, lovely
trees and fertile lands. His grandfather, whom he had loved so dear-
ly, was buried in the family cemetery on that estate. He hurriedly
made a few necessary repairs and improvements and hastened to
Augusta with the wonderful news that would enable the family to
leave the unhealthy surroundings in Augusta and return to a home so
familiar and so beloved. Mr. Watson brought the younger children
home with him, while his mother soon followed with the household
goods. Imagine her joy and pride as she realized what her favorite
138 THE WATSONIAN
son, just twenty-one years old, had now done for her and the smaller
children !
Money being scarce, it was necessary that all the family join in
and work on the farm. Mr. Watson boarded with them, walking the
four miles twice each day to and from his office in Thomson. In spite
of all these privations, Mr. Watson managed, in some way, to keep
his younger sisters in a private girls' school kept by Miss Georgia Dur-
ham.
Gradually the farm showed signs of prosperity; yields became
more abundant, live stock increased, the health of the family, includ-
ing the elder Mr. Watson, improved, and a bright day dawned for
the Watsons. Wasn't young Thomas E. a veritable personification of
the "Up And At 'Ems" spirit?
CHAPTER IV, "MISS GEORGIA DURHAM," IN JUNE ISSUE
139
A SURVEY OF THE WORLD
PROMPT AND EFFECTIVE
JUSTICE. In the Atlanta Consti-
tution under the caption "Assail-
ant of Girl is Hanged in London"
we read:
"James Frederick Stratton, who
attacked a girl in a train on Feb-
ruary 21, was hanged this morn-
ing in the London jail, 37 days
after the crime. He would have
been hanged sooner had the crim-
inal court been sitting when the
crime occurred. The trial and sen-
tence took six minutes in Old
Bailey."
Also the Pathfinder gives us
this bit of foreign justice to crim-
inals — "Chile Asks Death Penalty
for Embezzlement" :
"The government has asked
congress for a law providing the
death penalty or life imprison-
ment for government officials who
defraud the government of 100,-
000 pesos ($12,000) or more.
Lighter punishment is provided
for smaller frauds. The request
was said to follow the discovery
of several cases of embezzlement
in the government service."
If the criminals in the United
States faced the death penalty or
life imprisonment for crimes like
embezzlement and knew that only
six minutes would be used for
the wheels of justice to grind out
a verdict with a sentence that no
executive could commute or nulli-
fy by pardon, there would be much
less work for our criminal courts,
and Clarence Darrow would be
compelled to find other channels
for the wonderful powers of his
intellect than defending criminals
whom he says "evoluted" from
beasts of lower creation.
* * *
A JURY OF TWELVE CITI-
ZENS. In The Southern Tobacco
Journal we saw the following:
"Of the six women on the Sa-
piro-Ford jury two are Catholics,
one Presbyterian, one Baptist,
One Universalist, one has brown
hair and wears horn-rimmed
spectacles. Two of the men are
Catholics and only one of the
jurors is a farmer. During re-
cesses the men gather into groups
for a smoke and the women prom-
enade the corridors but do not
smoke."
* * *
THE NEGRO RACE. The Soci-
ologist, Dr. Frank H. Haskins, has
predicted that the negro race
would become extinct in the Unit-
ed States within 200 years. The
processes of extinction, Dr. Has-
kins said, were due to climatic
140
THE WATSONIAN
conditions and the pressure of in-
dustrial competition. They prob-
ably would be retarded to a cer-
tain extent, he explained, by ne-
gro segregation in the south and
hastened by migration to the
north and by being scattered over
wide geographical areas, but he
regarded as certain the ultimate
passing of the negro as a factor in
the American population.
Well, to put it mildly, we think
the Doctor did not say what he
means. Does he mean that the
negro blood will be gone, and that
the negro characteristics will pass
away? If he does he ought to
come down to Georgia and actual-
ly learn something of the negro
race. The negro characteristics
on this earth are just about as
likely to change as the crowing
of the cock is to change to the
cooing of the dove, or that other
state of tranquility is to come to
pass, when "the lion and the lamb
shall lie down together." You
know, someone has said that when
that happens on earth the lamb
will be inside the lion. So when-
ever the negro race passes, ex-
cept by removal, from our nation
it will be by amalgamation, and
the negro blood will course
through the veins of those amal-
gamated descendants of ours 200
years or whenever it is from now.
Our pure Anglo-Saxon blood re-
bels at the thought. We respect
the negro in his place and believe
that he is just much of an im-
mortal soul as any white man that
ever lived, but we know that "his
place" is not in the white race,
by amalgamation, association,
legislation or any other kind of
"ation" whatsoever.
HISTORIC SCENES IN
CHARLESTON. While some of
us are using our life's energy
working for the emancipation of
the negro, let us give one linger-
ing thought to the fate of the
Indian.
Across the river from Charles-
ton, famous in Revolutionary and
Civil War history, is the ancient
fort of Moultrie. In the early
days of the eighteenth century
the Fort was used as a strong-
hold against the warring tribe of
the Seminoles, warring to keep
possession of their Fatherland.
At the head of this band of Red
Men was a fearless young Indian
brave, Oceola. Many a moon saw
Oceola plotting and fighting in his
horrible, uncivilized way. At
length he came to Fort Moultrie
under the white flag of truce,
never to return. He was captured
by the white men under whose
flag he had ventured to come, and
sentenced to live his future days
in a cement cell of Stygian dark-
ness. Never seeing the daylight,
his beautiful trees, his wild ani-
mals, his fish, nor his people, he
gradually grieved himself to death
in his dungeon.
A SURVEY OF THE WORLD
141
At his death, such is the in-
consistency of the white man, he
was formally buried before the
old Fort, his grave fenced in by
a wrought iron fence, at his head
a slab bearing the date of his
death and a quotation from the
white man's Bible to preserve the
memory of Oceola.
^ ii: ^
HOW MANY YEARS DO WE
LIVE? Mr. Edwin G. Dexter in
the Literary Digest gives us some
interesting figures on the age of
man. These statistics were com-
piled from individuals reaching
an advanced age. The number
considered at each period is
shown :
Date Number Aver Age
1925 550 69.20 yrs.
1915 597 70.33
1905 189 68.75
1895 207 70.90
1884 95 66.37
1875 110 66.01
19th Cent. 120 63.25
18th Cent. 136 69.7
17th Cent. 83 63.7
16th Cent. 163 60.31
15th Cent. 61 66.1
1st to 14th Cents. 134 59.22
Romans B. C. 39 65.18
Greeks B. C. 86 70.61
These figures are somewhat
startling just at this time when
our health columns in the news-
papers are telling us that we are
living longer than our ancestors.
It "throws cold water" on the hope
that was springing up in us for
ten or twenty years increased
prospect for our life. Statistics
do show that the average age is
increasing. This is because a
larger per cent of babies is being
saved. But Mr. Dexter delved
deeper into age statistics and in-
terprets them as they apply to
the "bumping-off" end of life
where we are most interested.
From this view we learn that the
ancient Greeks had it over us of
today by almost a year and a half,
when they did not know anything
of vaccination, appendicitis nor
Riggs Disease.
Will some of the long life ex-
perts please step to the front and
tell us how those old Greeks did
it?
^ ^ H:
WHAT WAS ISN'T NOW. The
Atlanta Constitution soliloquizes
under the heading, "It Used to Be
Vs. It Isn't Now," as follows:
"Bobbed hair has practically
ruined the hairpin business; the
"tube" gown and athletics have
curtailed the wear of corsets;
short skirts have ended the popu-
larity of high shoes and cotton
stockings; knickers have made a
complete change in the style and
amount of undergarments ; movies
have cut the number of theaters
catering to the spoken drama ; the
automobile and tractor are dis-
placing the horse; the phono-
graph, radio and player-piano are
effecting a radical change in
music."
These terse statements led us
142
THE WATSONIAN
to thinking, and we wish to make
some additions: The kitchenette
and paper bag of the corner
grocery have superseded the well-
filled larders of our grandmoth-
ers; the serm,onette has placed
the old time gospel preaching on
the shelf by the side of the relics
of bygone days; the rural free
mail delivery, thanks to Thomas
E. Watson, has enlightened our
people and dealt a knock-out blow
to the political crossroads "spiel-
er" with his deceit and demagog-
ism ; the surgeon's knife deftly re-
moving the diseased appendix
and the "long green" of the pa-
tient's pocket-book has forever
banished the cramp-colic. The
only redeeming feature in the
whole list is that the seven-year-
old boy of today wears long
breeches like our grandfathers
did, when they were so fortunate
as to wear any at all.
* * *
FARM RELIEF liEGISLATION.
Senator Walter F. George of
Georgia is quoted as saying that
some kind of measure including
perhaps the least objectionable
features of the McNary-Haugen
Bill will be proposed in the com-
iftg session of Congress.
The Senator says:
"In my opinion, no plan of farm
relief will avail unless it provides
a method by which prices of gen-
eral commodities are reduced
more nearly to the level of farm
commodities, thus making agri-
culture more attractive from the
investment point of view. Then
capital will find it advantageous
to promote agriculture.
"For the past five years or more
the price level of general com-
modities, except those of agricul-
ture, has been much higher than
that of farm products. The re-
sult has been that capital has been
largely invested in enterprises
producing these general com-
modities. So agricultural proper-
ties have suffered a loss of value
that will not be restored until
farm commodity prices are per-
manently increased to more near-
ly equal prices of products in
other lines of business and indus-
trial activity."
In these two paragraphs Sen-
ator George has made the whole
situation clear in the two
antipodal statements, "when
prices of general commodities are
reduced more nearly to the level
of farm commodities," which
stands out in bold relief over
against the other, until farm com-
modity prices are permanently in-
creased to more nearly equal
prices of products in other lines."
The Senator has undoubtedly
discovered the seat of our trou-
bles. Agriculture is becoming
more and more hectic in the
throes of this malignant disorder.
The remedy is what we need. No
further diagnosis is necessary. If
the remedy that will bring these
two together is one of legislation,
A SURVEY OF THE WCRLD
143
for God's sake let Congress act
promptly.
CHIEF JUSTICE TAFT'S RUL-
ING. On a situation in Ohio the
United States Supreme Court re-
cently issued a ruling, written by
Chief Justice Taft and concurred
in by the eight Associate Justices,
which has more than ordinary
merit if we give it a careful peru-
sal. We print it below.
The question in this case is whether
certain statutes of Ohio, in providing
for the trial by the Mayor of a village
of one accused of violating the Prohi-
bition Act of the State, deprive the ac-
cused of due process of law and violate
the Fourteenth Amendment of the Fed-
eral Constitution, because of the
pecuniary and other interest which
those statutes give the Mayor in the
result of the trial.
The Mayor of the village of North
College Hill, Ohio, had a direct per-
sonal pecuniary interest in convicting
the defendant who came before him
for trial, in the $12 of costs imposed
in his behalf, which he would not have
received if the defendant had been ac-
quitted. This was not exceptional, but
was the result of the normal operation
of the law and the ordinance.
The Mayor is the chief executive of
the village. He supervises all the other
executive officers. He is charged with
the business of looking after the
finances of the village. With his inter-
est as Mayor in the financial condition
of the village and his responsibility
therefor, might not a defendant with
reason say that he feared he could not
get a fair trial or a fair sentence from
one who would have so strong a motive
to help his village by conviction and
a heavy fine?
The Mayor received for his fees and
costs in the present case $12, and from
such costs under the Prohibition Act
for seven ihonths he made about $100
a month, in addition to his salary. There
are doubtless Mayors who would not
allow such a consideration as $12 costs
in each case to affect their judgment
in it, but the requirement of due pro-
cess of law in judicial procedure is not
satisfied by the argument that men of
the highest honor and the greatest self-
sacrifice could carry it on without
danger of injustice. Every procedure
which would offer a possible temptation
to the average man as a judge to forget
the burden of proof required to convict
the defendant, or which might lead him
not to hold the balance nice, clear, and
true between the State and the ac-
cused, denies the latter due process of
law.
The defendant was arrested and
charged with the unlawful possession
of intoxicating liquor. The plea was
not guilty, and he was convicted. No
matter what the evidence was against
him, he had the right to have an im-
partial judge.
We have not given this alone to
call attention to its merit as a
Supreme Court ruling, but the
literary value of it is unquestion-
ably high. The first statement
raises the question which in the
second paragraph is made specific.
In a logical sequence, the next
paragraph shows the official rela-
tionship, and raises a question
thereon. Then the application is
given in a longer paragraph in
which the expression "to hold the
balance nice, clear and true" is so
cutting that we can almost see the
blindfolded female figure standing
144
THE WATSONIAN
before us with the scales of jus-
tice suspended from her hand.
The last paragraph sums it all up,
ending with the words — "he had
the right to have an impartial
judge" — which embodies the
highest conception of any and
every court.
^ ^ ^
A SMILE OR TWO. The uni-
versal desire and the condition it
confronts are given in "Two
Bells" by the "Bum" and the
"Boss."
Bum: "Say, boss, can you give me a
job where I can keep dressed up all the
time and won't have to work?"
Boss: "I'll remember you and when I
find two jobs like that you can have
the other."
The same publication, quoting
from the Boston Transcript, re-
cites a familiar experience to
radio fans.
A bride asked her husband to copy
off a radio recipe she wanted. He did
his best, but got two stations at once,
one broadcasting the morning exercises
and the other the recipe. This is what
he took down:
"Hands on hips, place a cup of flour
on the shoulders, raise knees and de-
press toes and mix thoroughly in one-
half cup of milk. Repeat six times. In-
hale quickly, one-half teaspoonful of
baking powder, lower the legs and mash
two hard-boiled eggs in a sieve. Ex-
hale, breathe naturally and sift into a
bowl.
"Attention! Lie flat on the floor and
roll the v.-hite of an egg backward and
forward until it comes to a boil. In
ten minutes remove from the fire and
rub smartly with a rough towel.
Breathe naturally, dress in warm flan-
nels and serve with fish soup."
* * *
AUTOMOBILES AMONG STU-
DENTS. Recently the question
of students having automobiles in
school has been receiving some
rather far-sighted discussion. It
is claimed that students should
not be allowed to have autos at
school, for everyone knows that
the student likes to drive often
and fast, and that over-indulgence
in what he likes is his greatest
temptation and danger. His
youthful tendencies lead that way.
When he is left to choose, too
often pleasure comes before work.
People are beginning to ask
"what are colleges and universi-
ties for, anyway?" There is in-
creasing doubt as to whether the
time spent in these institutions
is used properly and profitably.
Someone has said, "As colleges
and universities get bigger and
richer with their continual beg-
ging and their generous endow-
ments, they are looked on more
and more as places of glorified
sport. It seems to be a round of
playing, dancing, swimming, boat-
ing, courting, singing, acting, au-
tomobiling, parading, dressing,
pennant waving and loafing."
This is beginning to be the way
it looks to those on the outside
"looking on."
We agree heartily with those
who contend that the best insti-
tution of learning for a student is
A SURVEY OF THE WORLD
145
where the emphasis rests on ser-
ious work, prompted by a sincere
and constant effort to achieve re-
sults and reach greater heights in
learning. If these conditions exist
to a greater extent in smaller col-
leges, let our students go there.
The right sort of a college is a
real workshop.
* * *
NOBLE SENTIMENTS. _T h e
little poem below directs our
thoughts to higher, grander
achievements :
SUCCESS
It's doing your job the best you can.
And being just to your fellow-man;
It's making money — but holding friends,
And striving true to your aims and
ends ;
It's figuring how and learning why,
And looking forward and thinking high.
And dreaming a little and doing much;
It's keeping always in closest touch
With what is finest in word and deed;
It's being thorough, yet making speed;
It's daring blithely the field of chance
While making labor a brave romance;
It's going onwai'd despite defeat,
And fighting staunchly whate'er you
meet;
It's being clean and playing fair;
It's laughing lightly at Dame Despair;
It's looking up at the stars above,
And drinking deeply of life and love;
It's struggling on with the will to win,
But taking loss with a cheerful grin;
It's sharing sorrow and work and mirth,
And making better this good old earth;
It's serving, striving thrugh strain and
stress;
It's doing your noblest — that's Success.
— Berton Braley.
MUSSOLINI MANUFACTURES
MUNITIONS. In view of recent
developments in China with re-
gard to her relationship to the
leading nations of the world and
her not very clear relationship to
Russia, our mind reverts to an
article appearing in the New York
Times last February under the
caption, "Italy's War Factories
Working Full Blast, British Labor
Organ Says, Asking What's Up."
The cause prompting this sensa-
tional headline is given as fol-
lows : " Italy Gets Ready' is the
heading given by the Daily Herald
to a sensational dispatch from its
Locarno correspondent stating
that all Italian munition works
are in full swing."
After enumerating the details
of Italy's warlike manufacturing
program, stating that "all firearm,
shell and cartridge factories" are
showing remarkable activity in
these lines, the following rather
warlike paragraphs conclude the
article :
"Commenting upon this dis-
patch. The Daily Herald asks
'What is Signor Mussolini prepar-
ing?' and quotes a statement the
Duce made to an Austrian inter-
viewer last month:
" 'Italy must spread or ex-
plode,' he said.
" 'Can we be blamed if we turn
our eyes to the Orient?' he is de-
clared to have said to another in-
terviewer. 'Italy must expand.
146
THE WATSONIAN
No power has a right to stand in
the way.'
"The Daily Herald's assertion
that Mussolini is preparing some-
thing is taken for granted by
every Foreign Office in Europe.
" 'Is he planning a new Balkan
war or a new invasion of Asia
Minor, or what?' asks the paper."
It seems that there is consider-
able commotion around Mussolini,
the Italian Dictator. If it is
around Mussolini, the man, the
commotion will soon subside and
be forgotten. If the commotion is
the concentration of circum-
stances, racial, religious and econ-
omic, around a military character
like Mussolini, then we may ex-
pect some international move-
ments and adjustments.
♦ ♦ 5^
THE INFLUENCE OF SUN-
SPOTS. A Russian Professor, Dr.
Tchijovsky, has formulated a
scientific system whereby he de-
clares that man's greatest
achievements, the world's great-
est carnage, its most sifinificant
revolution and its mightiest lead-
ers, have developed and have had
their period of influence simply
because human beings have been
rendered susceptible to their
teachings and their arguments by
the change of their physical
beings wrought by the sun. In
declaring that the world is thus
subject to a superterrestrial powd-
er which it cannot escape, the
Russian meteorologist does not
admit to any theory of fatalism.
In this he is not like Sidney
Smith, who in his cartoon makes
his Chinese character. Chin Chow,
say — "Who can escape the net of
destiny? If you were born to be
drowned, you need not live in a
desert."
Dr. Tchijovsky takes the posi-
tion on the contrary, that man can
take advantage of these recurring
periods of activity, and shape the
energy transformed into action
thereby to his own mighty pur-
poses.
"We are in the slavery of the sun in
a certain way," he declared in his paper,
"but it does not oblige us to do this or
that only something. Humanity in the
past has followed the way of the least
resistance, and has drowned itself in
oceans of blood.
"It is more than an idealistic hope,"
he continues, "that the culture of the
future generations will find ways to a
humanitarian use of the mass upheaval,
by means of a preliminary propaganda
for some undertaking of great public
intei'est and importance which is to be
completed in the period of maximum ex-
citability. Then scientific expeditions,
sports competitions, the building of stu-
pendous structures, collective theatrical
art, collective creative art with mass
participation would occupy the place of
human bloody slaughter.
"Forecasts for the years 1927-29,
when the eleven-year period of sun-
spot activity attains its maximum and
when this maximum will coincide with
the maxima of two other periods of
sixty years and thirty-five years, a
great human activity of the highest his-
torical impoi'tance will take place which
A SURVEY OF THE WORLD
147
may again change the political chrat of
the world as a result of a similar
maxima in 1870."
History tells us that Alsace-
Lorraine was taken from the
French by the Germans in 1870.
This was returned when the
World War ended.
If this eminent Professor is
correct in his position, the ques-
tion arises— What big thing is
about to transpire? It may be
that the Chinese, the Russians,
Mussolini, the Catholics or the
Anti-Prohibitionists will be stir-
ring up a little sand in some cor-
ner of this terra firma. Let's all
be on the lookout for it, for we
are all interested in the sun and
modern science and invention have
expanded our world interests till
they encircle the globe. We are
interested in whatever transpires
in Anam, Hindustan, Alaska, Ni-
caragua, Paris, the United States
Congress and our neighborhood,
even listening-in sometimes to
what Madam Gossip has to say.
* * *
THE VASTNESS OF THp UNI-
VERSE. The Astronomical So-
ciety of the Pacific issued Leaflet
No. 10 in March which directs our
attention to the marvelous pro-
gress that man has made in the
knowledge, structure and extent
of the universe.
After discoursing at length on
the developments in the science of
Astronomy, this leaflet closes by
leading us out intyo space with
the following:
"Man has left written records
of himself which carry us back
6,000 years. Beyond this there
is a period of about 500,000 years
during which he left traces of his
existence in the form of carvings,
paintings and crude implements.
Back of this, the fossils of the
Earth will carry the investigator
along a trail of life that can be
followed for perhaps 100 million
years. At this point in time the
scientist stands before the veil
that hides from him the begin-
nings of life on the Earth.
"It is staggering to reflect that
light which travels at a speed that
can compass the Earth in about
one-eighth of a second, that can
reach the Moon in one and one-
fifth seconds, and the sun in eight
minutes, has required far longer
to traverse the ascertined limits
of space than it has taken the
whole of the known links in the
chain of life to develop. It is also
a matter of no small wonder that
the science of astronomy has
reached a point in its development
where it can measure these vast
distances with confidence. To
have pushed the boundaries of the
observable universe back from the
80,000,000 miles of the early
workers to a distance which re-
quires 20 digits to express it in
miles is an achievement surely
without parallel in the entire
range of Man's activities."
148
ROMAN CATHOLIC HIERARCHY
BY
THOS. E. WATSON
McCarthy's exposures of conditions in the Roman Catholic portion of Ireland;
Thomas F. Ryan's projected Roman Catholic bank; Rome conquering North
America; Roman Catholic doctrine of the Chui'ch above the State; Statistics
of the Progress of the Roman Catholic Chuixh in the United States; Lafay-
ette's warning.
CHAPTER III.
"I am a Catholic. I am an Irishman. I have a right to speak."
In these words, Michael J. M. McCarthy, eminent scholar and bar-
rister-at-law, prefaced a portion of his sensational exposures of con-
ditions in the Catholic portion of Ireland.
Said he, "It is sacerdotal interference and domination, beginning
in the infant school and ending with the legacy for masses after death,
that will be found to be the true and universal cause of that universal
degeneracy upon which we so comiserate ourselves." He then con-
trasts the decadence and the misery which prevail in Catholic Ireland
with the industry, prosperity, and progressiveness of Protestant Ire-
land.
Of Cork, McCarthy says, "It has erected religiosity and mendi-
cancy on a pinnacle before which it bows down and worships, and
the poor beautiful city 'has its reward.' The priest-educated Catholic
citizens of Cork are, in the aggregate, men without minds. . . .
I express what hundreds of thousands of Cork people themselves
think; and I would gladly suffer any personal loss, even that of life
itself, if I could turn my native country off the road to ruin upon
which it has been traveling since the priests awoke under Italian
inspiration fifty years ago." Speaking of Dublin, the author says, "If
we examine the standing army of priests and nuns, who are quartered
in such affluence in the city of Dublin, our astonishment cannot fail
to be increased at finding so much vice and misery among the poorer
classes of the Catholic population."
Again he says, "Few people, even in Ireland, realize what vast
amounts are handed over to the priests for masses." He then gives
instances, one of them — it being the giving of about eight thousand
ROMAN CATHOLIC HIERARCHY 149
dollars to the Bishop of Limerick, O'Dwyer, to pay for masses for the
repose of the souls of Mary O'Grady, her parents, and relatives. The
author said : "I do not censure those clerics most for the actual taking
of the money. I blame them most of all for so enervating the minds of
our people that they dare, in their ignorance, when at death's door, to
buy off the Almighty Himself through the priest, as they have been
buying the priest from the cradle to the grave. How can a land thrive
when the mind of the nation is in such a condition?"
It is stated that the Roman Catholic Church has withdrawn many
of its foreign investments, and reinvested its surplus in American
securities.
VATICAN LOOKS TO AMERICA.
The Vatican is coming to look more and more toward America as the Catholic
stronghold. The wonderful strides of the church in the United States has not
only been a source of keen gratification to Pope Pius, but has led the curia to
believe that the New World offers more possibilities than the Old.
Mr. Ryan is very much persona grata at the Vatican. He is in intimate touch
with the financial affairs of the Roman Catholic Church, and it is predicted that
it is only a matter of a short time until he, or rather his banking house, will
have carte blanche with the vast funds of the church.
Mr. Ryan will have for his associates in the banking venture his sons, Allan
and Glenin Rogers. The firm will be Thomas F. Ryan & Sons, and I understand
the firm will be known in the United States as a private banking house.
You doubtless remember who Thomas F. Ryan is : you can doubt-
less recall some of his unsavory record. His career as the looter of
the traction lines of New York City, the looter of the Seaboard Air
Line Railway, the corrupter of courts and legislature, the purchaser
of political nominations, and the debaucher of Virginia politics, smells
to Heaven.
Incidentally, the Virginia delegation was carried to the National
Convention in 1904 by Ryan himself, in his private car. They voted
for Judge Parker, of course, whose nomination Ryan and Belmont
bought.
These facts are recapitulated in order that you may have some
idea of what it means to this country when the vast accumulations of
money and the enormous annual revenues of the Catholic Church are
placed in the custody of a man who has demonstrated his ability to
control the municipality of New York, the State Legislature of New
York, the politics of Virginia, and the National Convention of the
Democratic Party.
Tammany Hall is a Catholic organization, organized for political
plunder, and dividing the loot with the priests. Ryan is the master of
150 THE WATSONIAN
Tammany also, and this was what gave him immunity from punish-
ment while he was robbing the people through his traction deals. If
he becomes the Pope's financial agent, with the almost unlimited re-
sources of Rome at his disposal, the campaign for the political con-
trol of America by the Italian Hierarchy will begin, in earnest.
For years and years, the American priesthood has been preparing
the minds of the people to take orders from Rome on matters political.
For years and years, they have been concentrating their energies on
America. For years and years, they have been steadily advancing
on New York and Washington City, two strategic points of the great-
est importance. From the city of New York, the business world is
controlled. From that great metropolis issue the magazines and the
newspapers of the largest circulation. From that city the transpor-
tation companies are controlled. He who rules in New York is the
king of this nation. The financial interests of that city dominate those
of all others. Wall Street expands and contracts the currency, pre-
cipitates panics and checks them, dictates Governmental policies, over-
awes administrations, beats Congress into submission to its will, uses
the National treasury as a branch bank of its own, compels the Gov-
ernment to withdraw from circulation $150,000,000 of its own gold,
gets another mortgage on the Republic whenever it needs one in its
business; and, upon occasion, can practically suspend the circulation
of the nation's own money, send prices and fortunes crashing down-
ward, while the President of the United States, the officers of the
law, the army and the navy, and a nation of nearly a hundred
million people look helplessly on.
With the colossal riches of the Roman Catholic Church at his
command, Thomas F. Ryan could absolutely dominate New York and
Wall Street ; and, through the instrumentalities already indicated, con-
trol American commerce, American politics, American legislation,
American politics at home and abroad, and — worst of all — poison the
American mind, and thus do for our country what the Italian hier-
archy has done for Catholic Ireland, Catholic Portugal, Catholic Spain,
and Catholic Central and South America.
It being a cardinal tenet of Rome that all races are equal and
all men brothers, it necessarily follow^s that, in a country like ours,
where we have so many millions of colored people, the domination of
the priesthood would be followed by consequences more horrible than
the domination of the papal hierarchy has inflicted upon any other
portion of the world.
That the Catholic priests in America, with subtle forethought,
ROMAN CATHOLIC HIERARCHY 151
have been carefully preparing the American mind to accept the doc-
trine of political supremacy in political affairs, may be a startling fact
to most of our readers, but it is easily proved. You have only to re-
call the attitude of the American priesthood at the time when the
French government was divorcing itself from the Catholic Church.
Cardinal Gibbons barked promptly and loudly when he got his orders
from the Vatican, and every member of the pack yelped after Gibbons
did. Many falsehoods were told by these priests, and few American
newspapers would publish corrections. There was one vitally im-
portant and hideously ugly fact which the American public never
heard of at all. Between many of the monasteries and nunneries an
underground passage was found, connecting the one building with
the other.
In the United States, political Romanism is sweeping all before it.
Twelve millions of our people profess its creed. A few months ago,
American prelates assured Papa Pius that our Republic would soon
belong to Rome. Not many weeks since, an American Roman Catholic
bishop declared that his church meant to capture the Presidency. It
is already the power behind the throne. Cardinal Gibbons was a
potentate whom Cleveland dared not offend ; and Presidents McKinley,
Roosevelt and Taft have been notoriously controlled in various in-
stances by the same insidious, irresistible influence.
The great number of our cities are ruled by a combination of the
priests and the saloon-keepers. Our municipal governments are the
rottenest on earth. From San Francisco to New York, the cry is
"graft, corruption, vice, crime, misery." Centres of population like
Philadelphia and Pittsburg are the despair of the patriot. In New
York, alone, thirty million dollars is the amount annually stolen from
the tax-payers, and under the priest-barkeeper regime the debt of that
one city has been made as large as the public debt of the United States
Government.
What, then, is the literal fact?
While we Protestants are reaching out after Cuba, Jamaica and
South America, Rome is conquering North America ! We are annually
losing to her, in the United States, enormously more than we take
from her in all the other Roman Catholic countries put together.
Why not let Italy remain Roman Catholic, and Cuba remain
Roman Catholic, and South America remain Roman Catholic, until we
have called home all our workers, concentrated all of our energies,
and put Roman Catholicism to rout in our native land? What shall
it profit us to redeem South American republics, and lose our own?
152 THE WATSONIAN
The proposition upon which our Republic was founded is: that
in the people rests the sovereignty which makes and changes the
governments. We deny the divine right of kings. We deny the in-
fallibility and the supreme power of popes. We claim that every in-
dividual is "equally as free and independent" as any other; and that
no priest has the right to dictate to us in matters of conscience.
Roman Catholicism threatens the very foundations of our insti-
tutions, strikes at the very root of our liberties.
A good Roman Catholic is bound to believe that supreme sover-
eignty is inherent in the holy Papa at Rome, and that the Papa has the
power, as the viceregent of Christ, to depose kings and rule nations.
That has always been the Roman Catholic doctrine, and the church
boasts that it never changes. It can wait, it can dissemble, it can
wheedle and hoodwink and deceive, but it does not in spirit change.
Its purpose is ever the same, and wherever it has been master, it has
been a blight.
So late as 1867, Cardinal Manning, of England, reaffirmed the
papal doctrine of supreme sovereignty over Christian peoples. Says
the Cardinal, "It is necessary that — the temporal authorities should
be subject to the spiritual power. * * * Moreover, we declare, say,
define and pronounce it to be altogether necessary to salvation that
every human creature should be subject to the Roman pontiff."
Bishop Gilmour, of Cleveland, Ohio, in a Lenten letter, 1883,
wrote: "Nationalities must be subordinated to religion, and we must
learn that we are Catholics first and citizens next. God is above man
and the Church above the State."
Mgr. Vaughan, in 1906, declared in the Sunday Herald, of Bos-
ton, Mass., that "the Catholic Church is the servant and the menial
of no earthly sovereign and of no temporal government." "So long
as the civil government confines itself within its proper sphere, it will
find no more devoted subjects than Catholics. But when it breaks
through its proper boundaries and attempts to trample under foot the
rights of conscience and the laws of God, then we will all admit that
obedience in those matters would be but another name for perfidy and
apostasy, to which death itself is greatly to be preferred."
The Bishop of Newport, England, said in a pastoral letter, issued
last year:
"There is at least one principle which may be laid down for the
guidance of Catholics in this country, as everywhere else. The
church has the right to intervene even in practical politics, and when
she speaks. Catholics are bound to obey. By the church is here meant
ROMAN CATHOLIC HIERARCHY 153
the local authorities which have the duty of deciding in grave and
difficult emergencies, for example, the bishops of the province. To
contend that the bishop may only pronounce upon abstract questions,
and may not authoratively direct their flock to support or oppose a
concrete and definite measure, or to vote for or against an existing
'party' at an election, is to paralyze the church's arm."
There you have the orthodox Roman Catholic doctrine. It is at
deadly war with republican institutions, for we say in our fundamental
law that the Church shall have nothing to do with the State. They
must forever be kept separate. Roman Catholicism contends that
they must not only come together but that the relation between them
must be that of master and servant. What the Roman Catholics are
aiming to do is to give us presidents and cabinets that will look to
Rome for orders.
When we naturalize a foreigner, we compel him to take an oath
renouncing allegiance to any and all foreign powers ; but the Roman
Catholics of America are bound to obey, as their surpreme, infallible
master, an old Italian priest, sitting enthroned among the slippery
but powerful politicians of the Vatican. The profession of faith sanc-
tioned by the Catholic Council which was held in Baltimore in 1884,
contains the following oath of allegiance: "I pledge and swear true
obedience to the Roman Pontiff, vicar of Jesus Christ."
In case there should be a conflict between the law of our land and
the laws of the church, the Roman Catholic must obey his church.
Here is a clause from this canon law : "No oaths are to be kept
if they are against the interest of the church."
Who is to decide M^hether the oath is detrimental to the church?
Either the person who took the oath, or his priest, or his pope. There-
fore all oaths are subject to be annulled at the pleasure of the hier-
archy.
We believe in liberty of conscience. Our laws safeguard it. The
popes deny it, and make "war upon the doctrine as a damnable heresy.
In Roman Catholicism, the priests are under the holy Papa, the keep-
ers of the people's conscience. Not only does Roman Catholicism de-
clare that Protestants have no rights where Romanism is triumphant,
but the bishops' oath binds them to persecute all who will not bow
to the "our said Lord and his successors." Our said Lord is, of course,
the aged Italian gentleman who calls himself the vicar of Christ.
Suppose Baptist and Methodist clergymen were required to take
a solemn oath to persecute the Roman Catholics, — there would be a
154 THE WATSONIAN
howl, wouldn't there? Yet nobody says a word when papal bishops
are sworn in, as persecutors of the Protestants.
Princes of the Roman Hierarchy very frankly declare that they
only allow liberty of conscience where they are in the minority. Where
they are in the majority, they refuse it, and they persecute.
As to the public schools, everybody knows where Romanism
stands. It is waging relentless warfare against the free, non-sectarian
school, its purpose being to put the children in the power of the nuns
and the priests. Wherever Rome has ruled, she has left the people
sunk in ignorance. Never has she encouraged the laity to study the
Bible. In every possible way, she has striven to make learning a
sealed book to the masses, compelling them to look to the priest for
guidance.
Against our system of popular education, the holy Papa and his
satellites have launched the poisoned shafts of bitter religious hatred.
Our public schools are characterized as filthy, vicious, diabolical, god-
less, scandalous, pestilential, a social plague, breeders of unrestrained
immorality.
Our forefathers knew what the Roman Catholic Hierarchy was.
Its record, — reeking with crime and fraud — was familiar to them. Its
enmity to popular rights, its foul partnerships with tyrannical kings,
its frightful atrocities of persecution, its devouring greed and its cor-
rupting influence upon nations, were but too well known. The con-
vents which had become brothels, the shameless sale of licenses to
commit sin, the peddling of indulgencies which remitted sin, the
massacres encouraged by the church, the ghastly and wholesale mur-
ders of the Inquisition, the broods of bastards that clung around the
knees of cardinals and popes, the monstrous impositions and hy-
pocrisies by which the priests preyed upon the masses while holding
them down in the densest ignorance, — victims of the nobility, of the
king and of the papal hierarchy, — had excited a profound indignation
in the men who framed our Government. Everything that our fathers
could do to save us from the insidious encroachments of priestcraft
was done.
But the children forgot the reason why the fathers so dreaded the
Roman Catholic Church. The children know not the record of crime
and devastation which caused our forefathers to detest the Roman
Hierarchy. Consequently the Pope has found our Republic an easy
prey to his designs. In the year 1800 there were but fifty priests at
work in the United States. In 1890 there were 8,332. In 1800 there
ROMAN CATHOLIC HIERARCHY 155
were but 10,000 Roman Catholics in the United States. In 1890, there
were 8,277,039. At present there are 12,000,000.
In 1800, the Roman Catholics had no foothold in this country,
and no appreciable influence upon public affairs. At present they are
powerful in all our cities ; and in the great West, which will rule the
future of this country, the Roman Catholics have grown enormously,
and almost have controlling numbers. In 1800, there were 3,030
evangelical churches ; now there are nearly fifty times as many. But
the Roman Catholics had no churches in 1800, while they now have
12,449. They have almost doubled the number of their churches in
twenty years.
In view of these statistics, the warning of Lafayette, himself a
Roman Catholic, is worth remembering. The "Knight of Liberty"
knew the political record of the Roman Catholic Hierarchy and he
predicted :
'Tf the liberties of the American people are ever destroyed, they
will fall by the hands of the Romanish clergy."
Already we have members of our highest law-making body who
consider it an honor to be allowed to kiss the foot of a man ! Already
we have members of the United States Supreme Court, and one
member of the Cabinet, who would feel incredibly elated at being given
a Vatican "audience," in which they would humbly kneel before a man,
and touch his slipper with their devout lips. Already we have twelve
millions of people in America to whom the privilege of abasing them-
selves in the presence of a venerable Italian priest is an unattainable
blessing of which they can only dream, while they from a distance
adore.
God of our fathers! Isn't it enough to terrify the American
patriot, when he sees unthinking girls who are burying themselves
alive in the Enclosed Orders, sees the priest shackling the press ; sees
the church of idolatry and superstition absorbing our people by the
million, and eating the heart of independence out of a great nation ?
Protestant missionaries! Again we ask you, what will it profit
ourselves, our country, or our God, to redeem Jamaica and Cuba and
South America from the Romanish priests, and to lose to them our
own Republic?
In the great Roman Catholic Congress which has been in session
in Montreal, Canada, Father Bernard Vaughan, the celebrated priest
whose work in England has attracted world-wide attention, delivered
an address about which all America is now (Sept. 12, 1910) talking.
He did the country a good service by startling it into a realization of
156 THE WATSONIAN
the true spirit of the Italian hierarchy. Father Vaughan declared,
with a brutality seldom equalled, that woman bad no place in public
life. With the true viedicial spirit, he advocated the narrowing of her
sphere of usefulness. In all directions, we see that women are being
chosen to fill the most responsible positions, and seldom or never do
we hear of their robbing the cash drawers, or betraying their employ-
ers. The sphere of woman's activities and usefulness is constantly
widening, and it is well that it should be so. There are many women
who are disinclined to wedlock, and others who never meet a man
whom they really desire to marry: others are practically compelled
to marry men who are unworthy: it would be a sad thing, if the
modern world offered no avenue of escape to such women.
Father Vaughan said: '7 think it is a grand thing to see a woman
take in washing." No One but a Roman Catholic priest could have
uttered such words. That abominable point of view is the direct re-
sult of priestly education. A country in which all the women are bend-
ing their backs at the washtub would, in the eyes of such as Vaughan,
Gibbons, and Logue, be a grand nation. The hierarchy has brought
the women to just about that condition wherever they control.
Inasmuch as Vaughan says that the Roman Catholics will soon
control this country, our women might as well prepare to go to the
washtub. When the priests and the nuns have increased in this
country as they have done in every country controlled by the Roman
Hierarchy, the wealth will be swept into untaxed churches and papal
investments; and it may be that the beggar and the washerwoman
will be the living witness of papal control, as they are in Catholic
Europe, Catholic Mexico, and Catholic South America.
EDITORIAL NOTES
157
®I|e Wataomatt
"Not until tyrants have found a way to kill
justice and to chain the thoughts of men will
they ever be able to put bad laws where they are
safe for the future." — Thos. E. Watson.
Published by
The Tom Watson Book Co., Inc.
Thomson, Georgia
GEORGIA WATSON LEE, Editor
WALTER J. BROWN,
Business Manager and Associate Editor
Application Second-class Rate Pending
Thomson, Ga.
MAY — 1927
Vol. 1
No. 4
lE&ttnrtal Nnt^a
THE SYNDICATORS:
How much money Al Smith's Wall
Streeters are paying the Syndi-
cate writers* to write all the fairy
tales about their candidate.
We do not know. Nor either
do we know how much medium
♦Newspaper writers whose writings are car-
ried by leading newspapers throughout the
United States.
of exchange the newspapers
are receiving to publish the
pack of lies sent out from Wash-
ington and New York, the home
of the Syndicators. But there is
one thing a certainty, and that
is, these writers are writing, and
these newspapers are publishing
not for any convictions they may
have to serve their Country. Is it
for the dollar or is it to please
their Catholic readers and adver-
tisers ?
Let them remember that when
you lose your Country all things
in your Country are lost. Let the
Catholic Church capture the
Presidency and watch the free
lances who criticise the Catholic
church be denied the privileges of
the mails.
It is dangerous ground. Be-
ware! !
Misquotes
These syndicators are grasping
all possible means in their effort
to "Sell Smith to the South." Last
month they were on the rampage
quoting Gregory, Burleson, Glass,
and Daniels as McAdoo's Cabinet
mates who had deserted him for
Smith. At this writing we have
only noticed where two of the
above leading democrats have de-
nied these mis-quotes. Carter
Glass says:
I neither predicted Gov. Smith's nom-
ination or election nor did I state, as
many newspapers have published, that
either Virginia or I would favor Gov.
Simth's nomination, on the contrary I
do not think that Virginia would favor
158
THE WATSONIAN
the nomination of Gov. Smith nor do I
personally advocate his nomination.
In a letter to the Boston Herald
Josephus Daniels said:
He was in hearty accord with the
sentiment, certainly in North Carolina,
that the Democratic party would make
a serious mistake if we nominate a
wet man for President.
Did the same newspapers that
spread over their front pages
these news items saying that
these men were supporting Smith,
give the same space for the denial
by the men quoted? NO!
SOUTH AND WEST:
Following a news dispatch from
Des Moines, Iowa, stating that
Senator Thos. J. Heflin favored a
union between the Agricultural
South and the Agricultural West,
the Atlanta Constitution printed
an editorial under the head of
"Heflin's Hobgoblins."
After ridiculing such a sugges-
tion their editorial closes with
this:
What the Democratic party needs to-
day is a campaign for unity and not
for division — a campaign of tolerance
and not of bigotry and prejudice.
Here is your tolerance cry
again.
After reading the Constitu-
tion's editorial there comes to our
mind these few words from Wat-
son's Prose Miscellanies, written
in the second person.
But there came a change.
The political party when in conven-
tion after convention had adopted your
platform, suddenly changed front and
denounced those principles.
What were you to do?
You decided that Principles were
dearer than party, and you stood by
your principles.
It is a boasted fact that the two
old parties are controlled by Wall
Street and the Trusts. Does this
not make them a party for a few
rather than a party for the
masses ?
We conscientiously believe that
if Jefferson and Lincoln should re-
turn and see how their old parties
were being manipulated by a few
for a few they would advocate a
third party.
To our mind Jeffersonian Dem-
ocracy should be the rule and
guide of our National Govern-
ment.
If the next Democratic Conven-
tion nominates Al Smith and de-
serts Jeffersonian principles, this
Democrat deserts the party. And
further if a Third Party is form-
ed embodying these principles into
their platform and choose an
American citizen to head the
party who has sworn no allegiance
to a foreign pope, then this Dem-
ocrat votes a Third Party ticket
with apologies to NO ONE.
♦ ^ *
POPULISM:
While we are on this subject of
a Third Party, let us turn our
thoughts back to those perilous
days of the 90's.
Who wrote the Ocala platform ?
EDITORIAL NOTES
159
We Watsonites know the an-
swer.
This platform was the platform
of a Populist party, the platform
on which Mr. Watson was a can-
didate for Vice President.
What do we find the Atlanta
Constitution saying then relative
to that Third Party. Here it is :
Populism was a political adventurer
sprung from the ranks of the dis-
gruntled.
The Savannah Morning News
used this language:
Such a lot of cranks, demagogues,
small politicians, dangerous theorists,
and agitators never before collected to-
gether.
When Mr. Watson wrote the
famous Ocala platform nearly
every prominent journal de-
nounced both the platform and
writer; these journals could see
nothing good in either the "creed"
or the "dreamer" but the great
newspapers have changed their
views and they have written beau-
tiful editorials for the income tax,
direct election of Senators, the 8
hours law, and the rural free de-
livery system.
And the happy thought is that
the "dreamer" lived to see every
one of these demands of the Ocala
platform either enacted into law
or advocated by the people who
once bitterly denounced both
dreamer and dreams.
Senator Brookhart of Iowa
says:
I believe in all 17 major propositions
advocated by the Populists of the
United States have now gone either into
our statutes or into the Constitution of
the United States.
Friends, Watson third party
work was not in vain.
Although he lost yet he won.
When we see the two old par-
ties playing to the hand of Wall
Street or the moneyed interests
against the farmer who produces
the wealth of our nation; when
we see these parties playing to
the trusts who have bled the
farmers almost to death ; when we
see the old parties catermg to the
liquored interests; when we see
the old parties catering to a
Catholic vote; when we see the
old parties being led into a trap
set by the Pope of Rome,
Yes!!! sometimes we feel like
agreeing with Senator Heflin and
saying AWAY WITH THE OLD
PARTIES, BRING ON A NEW.
^ ^ ^
RELIGION IN SCHOOLS:
Catholicism rules in Chile. And
what do they have there. This
news item from the New York
Times is what the Pope , would
like to see in America.
Santiago, Chile, March 23. — Aboli-
tion of Catholic religious instruction in
the public schools brought an energetic
Archbishop of Santiago, in a pastoral
protest from Mgr. Crescentio Errazuriz,
letter published today. He declared
that religious teaching for children was
a necessity and called on the public to
strive "to terminate the grave wrong"
committed by the Government.
Answering the letter, in a declaration
160
THE WATSONIAN
to the newspapers, the Minister of In-
struction, Aquiles Vergara, reiterated
that it was the Government's intention
to separate Church and State, as pro-
vided in the Constitution.
Abolition of Catholic religious in-
struction in the schools, he said, was
merely to assure equal rights for all
religions, as well as to free the Gov-
ernment from connection with the
Church.
He announced that the Government
had decided to permit religious instruc-
tions in the schools again, but that the
instruction would not be compulsory
and instructors would receive no pay
from the State. This instruction would
have to be outside the regular school
hours. The right to establish classes
would not be limited to Catholics, but
all religions would have an equal op-
portunity to enter the field.
Religious instructions formerly was
part of the regular school program and
Catholic instructors were paid by the
Government. Priests also have been
discharged from other public posts in
which they were installed under former
Cabinets, chiefly as army chaplains.
* * *
PROTESTANT HERESY:
Catholicism rules in Poland and
what happened there last month ?
An item from Time, a weekly-
news magazine printed in Cleve-
land follows:
"Protestant Heresy"
So cumulative and persistent is the
undeviating policy of the Popes in or-
derly succession that the Holy See is
seldom forced to act in the brusque and
hasty manner of statesmen who feel
they have but one life to live and that
one short.
Yet, at opportune moments, the
Papacy can and does strike swift and
sharp. Last week, in Poland, where
95Vc of all Y. M. C. A. members are
Roman Catholics, the Archbishop of
Warsaw, Alexander Cardinal Kakaw-
ski, decided to smash the "Y" at one
blow. This he prepared to do by is-
suing a formal message to all Polish
Christians:
"I warn the Christian population
under my leadership against the in-
fluences of the Protestant controlled and
heretical Young Men's Christian As-
sociation on Catholic youths. I base my
warning on the Pope's decree dated
Nov. 5, 1920. The Y. M. C. A. is
neither Polish nor Catholic. It is sup-
ported by Protestants and heretics and
anyone who gives a cent to this insti-
tution is harming the Church and Polish
youth. We cannot give our Catholic
youth to this American heresy, born and
bred of Protestant propaganda, which
is now being spread over the whole
world."
Observers recalled that Mme.. Mos-
cicki, wife of President Ignatz Moscicki
of Poland, is Charman of the Executive
Board of the Polish Y. M. C. A., an or-
ganization built up since the war with
funds contributed from the U. S.,
though there are today only five U. S.
citizens employed by the Polish Y. M.
C. A.
Most adept was the papal policy
which suggested that a decree of the
late Pope Benedict XV be used as the
authority for Cardinal Kakowski's
warning. By that means the present
Pope Pius XI, once Papa Nuncio to Pol-
and, will tend to escape criticism among
Poles.
Just another warning what the
movement now on foot by the
Cathyolics to capture the Presi-
dency will mean.
^ 4^ '¥
THE NINTH INNING:
William F. Mirk, well known
EDITORIAL NOTES
161
columnist, wrote just before his
death last month the following
poem.
The poem, title "The Ninth In-
ning," and couched in the terms
of the baseball diamond, follows :
The doctor knows what his trained
eyes see,
And he says it's the last of the ninth
for me.
One more swing while the clouds
loomed dark.
And then I must leave this noisy park.
'Twas a glorious game from the opening
bell-
Good plays, bad plays, and thrills pell
mell.
The speed of it burned my years away,
But I thank great God that He let me
play.
Are we thankful to God that he
is letting- us play?
^ ^ ^
R. F. D.:
Since the dispatch out of Wash-
ington announcing the death of
Mr. Perry S. Heath in Washington
on March 30th, and also stating
that he was father of Rural Free
Delivery Mails, The Watsonian
has been besieged with letters
asking us to deny this statement.
We quote from the dispatch,
Mr. Heath entered the Post Office De-
partment in 1897 under President Mc-
Kinley and with less than $30,000 au-
thorized by congress for experimental
purposes, he started the first work on
the greatest advancement in postal dis-
tribution in history.
The question is what resolution
gave the $30,00 or the $10,000.*
*The original appropriation for the system was
$10,000.
Would not the author of this
resolution be the father of Rural
Free Delivery?
What are the facts?
The general postoffice bill,
which carried all of the appropria-
tions for the Postoffice Depart-
ment was on the floor of the
House.
Mr. Watson having been reared
in the rural sections knew the
difficulty of the rural people in
procuring their mail. He placed
in the Ocala platform this demand
and of course he desired that the
work be started, therefore, he in-
troduced a resolution which would
place in the main bill $10,000 for
experimenting in a system which
would give the rural people their
free delivery of mails.
When the resolution was intro-
duced by Mr. Watson it was
laughed at as being ridiculous and
absurd. However, Mr. Watson
knew differently and in his de-
termined manner placed the
House on notice that unless this
resolution was given .consider-
ation he would stage a filibuster.
The House leaders, seeing the
danger of getting the main bill in-
volved, decided to accept the reso-
lution and same was incorporated
into the General Postoffice Bill.
And here we have the first ap-
propriation ever given for Rural
Free Delivery of Mails,
Without desiring to take away
any credit due Mr. Heath for his
splendid work in perfecting the
162
THE WATSONIAN
system we do say that Mr. Heath
is not the father of R. F. D. But
the father is the author of that
resolution which gave funds for
Mr. Heath to use in his experi-
mental work.
Let us quote from the Senate
Memorial Services to Thos. E.
Watson. Senator Ladd of North
Dakota made this statement,
One of his outstanding achievements
in behalf of the farmers of the nation
was in securing the first appropriation
in Congress for Rural Free Delivery.
The 44,405 rui'al mail carriers, who are
daily serving the 29,774,516 citizens of
the U. S. are living monuments to his
foresight and interest in the people in
the rui'al sections of the country, and as
a result of the success of the rural
system in America thousands of
Canadian families are today enjoying
the blesisng of his efforts in this re-
spect.
Rep. Charles F. Crisp in the
House Memorial services says
this:
During this Congress (1891-1892) he
inti'oduced a resolution making an ap-
propriation for establishment of the
rural mail service in this country, thus
becoming the father of this great gov-
ernment service which has been of in-
calculable benefit to the rural communi-
lies of the United States. In this same
Congress he led the debate requiring
all the railroads to use automatic car
couplers, the use of which has yearly
prevented thousands of deaths.
This should be proof to convince
any unbiased person who is the
FATHER OF RURAL FREE DE-
LIVERY.
Then why do they not place
credit where credit is due.
163
SHORT TALKS TO YOUNG MEN
MAKING THE EFFORT TO PLEASE AND A FEW
TABLE RULES
BY
THOS. E. WATSON
Your happiness in this world will largely depend upon your capacity to please.
"We are so involved in the complications of modern life that no one can make a
little world of his own and become a Robinson Crusoe. Thrown into various rela-
tionships with our fellow men, we either find pleasure or misery in their company.
Therefore, you should study to please, where you can do so without sacrifice of
principle or self-respect.
Now then:
Don't fall into the habit of asking your companion to repeat what be said.
That is a very common annoyance, and it is nothing in the world but carelessness.
It is mere habit and it is irritating.
Most of us have good ears; and if we will pay attention to what is being said,
we can hear it, well enough. In fact, many of the very people who use the "eh?"
have heard what you said, and will repeat it, if you fail to answer the ""Eh}" Try
it some time.
Don't, for Heaven's sake, don't contract the habit of biting your finger-nails.
I have known some otherwise elegant gentlemen to be addicted to that repulsive
vulgarity and filthiness. Shun it, by all means, for it is not only disgusting but
most offensive.
If the gas in your stomach results in the uncontrollable "belch," apologize to
your companions. Don't fail to say, "Excuse me."
That will set you right with the company, that might otherwise consider
you ill-mannered. As often as the unwelcome sound escapes you, repeat the "Ex-
cuse me."
At table, never convey food to your mouth on the knife. Use the fork,
always. It is often permissable to use your fingers: it is never so to use your
knife.
Nothing more quickly and conclusively proves good, or ill-breeding, than
"table manners." Therefore, study to be agreeable as possible, when eating in
company. It won't be a mistake, if you practice the best form, even when you
are alone.
Don't use the doily as a handkerchief. It is for your mouth and fingers.
164 THE WATSONIAN
Never tuck it in your shirt-collar, or waistcoat. It was never intended as an apron
or pinafore; and it is bad form to so use it. The correct thing is, to unfold the
napkin as soon as you are seated — and after the blessing," if one is asked — and
place it upon your knee.
Use it to clean your lips of the moisture of soup, and of any clinging particles
of food.
You may also use it to dry your fingers, after they have been dipped in the
finger bowl.
It is assumed that you washed your hands before the meal; and that nothing
but your fingers could have been greased, or otherwise made uncomfortable or un-
sightly, while you were taking food.
Never ivash your hands in the finger-bowl; just dip the fingers, and then wipe
them. To wash even the fingers is not permissable.
If any of the servants or fellow-guests makes a blunder, or happens to acci-
dent, you must not notice it — much less laugh at it and speak of it. Pretend not
to have seen or heard; and every well-bred person present will at once put you
down, as genteel.
Try to avoid dropping your knife or fork; but // you should, do not express
regret. It will be taken for granted that it was an unavoidable accident, for which
no apology is necessary. Say nothing, and do nothing. The hostess will quickly
send you another knife, fork, or spoon, as the case may be; and the servant will
pick up and carry to the side-board whatever it was you let fall.
Reginald, you must not pour out the tea or the coffee into the saucer. Wait
for it to cool, my boy, and then sip from the cup.
No: you must not blow it.
You must not ask for a second plate of soup. No, child; that is bad man-
ners.
Where soup is to be served, there will always be provided a large spoon,
usually with quite a depth and breadth of bowl. This largest of all the spoons,
placed next the plate, is the one for the soup.
If your plate should be handed to another part of the table to be "helped"
to something during the meal, don't put your knife and fork on it. Hold these
in your hands or lay them on the table until your plate returns.
Don't eat fast; don't eat noisily; don't take too big a mouthful; and don't
eat too much.
My sober and mature opinion is, that bad cookery, unwise selection of food,
and over-eating have "laid out" nearly as many men as J. Barleycorn ever did.
It may drive this thought home, if I tell you that I attribute my eternal youth
and inexhaustible vitality to the fact that I eat so little. Last fall, when making
two or three speeches a day, riding something more than a hundred miles in an
open car to reach the next appointment, besides doing my usual amount of work
SHORT TALKS TO YOUNG MEN 165
on THE JEFF, a glass of milk and a soft-boiled egg constituted my regular
meal. Often, it was the milk, without the egg.
Never forget this.
Most people eat too much.
There used to be a rule which forbade you to take the last biscuit, or what-
ever it was on the plate. I am sure there is no sense in the rule. It is your host
who is to blame if the supply of food on the dish runs so low; and you are not
gviilty of any breach of etiquette if, when you need another biscuit, piece of bread,
egg, slice of meat, or potato, you help yourself to the last one. But, in such a case,
the host is vnich at fault.
Now here is a rule that may stump you.
Never offer the host and hostess any dish: wait until you are so requested
by one of them.
I have never seen this canon of tact and good taste laid down anywhere, or
heard it mentioned by anybody, but my instinct teaches me that it is correct.
It is the host who is supposed to offer you the hospitality and the viands;
for you to offer him, unsolicited, some of his own provisions, is just as tactless as it
would be to ask him if he will please spend the night in his own house. See?
The point is delicate, but I have always felt that it was there. Not until the
host has expressly invited the guest to "Help yourself!" should any of them touch
any food on the table, much less pass it back and forth to other guests.
Of course, if the host says, at the beginning: "Let us all be free and easy,
and wait on ourselves!" it is different.
In that event, it would be courteous to place him on the footing of a fellow-
guest. But unless he does this, YOU are guest and he is host. It is this part to
have you served; not yours to serve him. He is feeding you; not you, him.
I am sure the distinction is sound; and it runs through the whole realm of
hospitality. Thus, the host either shows you to your room, or has a servant to do
it. You never think of showing the host to his.
Use your hands when breaking the bread, or taking a biscuit; use your fork,
when helping yourself to meat. The host should furnish to each dish, a spoon; to
each platter, a fork; to each butter-dish, a knife. Use these, and not your own
spoon, knife and fork.
Don't O! don't pick your teeth at the table.
And remember what I said about sniffling. If you have the habit, list it
with your New Year "swear-offs."
166
The Al Smith Letter
AN EDITORIAL
In an open letter Gov. Alfred E. Smith of New York replied to
Chas. C. Marshall's letter in the Atlantic Monthly. Mr. Marshall's let-
ter asked the Governor certain questions relative to the teachings of
the Catholic Church which conflicted with the Constitution of the
United States.
Gov. Smith did not answer the questions but evaded each point
and gave the impression that a man's religion was above reproach.
His letter is not written as a Roman Catholic defending his religion
against the criticism being propounded against it but is written as a
scheming politician who warped his religion to such a degree that he
would have you think that both he and his religion is truly American.
He has done nothing more or less than renounce his religion in every
instance where it conflicted with the laws as laid down by our fore-
fathers.
He summarizes his creed as follows :
I believe in the worship of God according to the faith and practice of the
Roman Catholic Church. I recognize no power in the institutions of my Church
to interfere with the operations of the Constitution of the United States or the
enforcement of the law of the land.
I believe in absolute freedom of conscience for all men and in equality of all
churches, all sects and all beliefs before the law as a matter of right and not as
a matter of favor.
I believe in the absolute separation of Church and State and in the strict
enforcement of the provisions of the Constitution that Congress shall make no
law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof.
I believe that no ti-ibunal of any church has any power to make any decree
of any force in the law of the land other than to establish the status of its own
communicants within its own church.
I believe in the support of the public school as one of the cornerstones of
American liberty. I believe in the right of every parent to choose whether his
child shall be educated in the public school or in a religious school supported by
those of his own faith.
I believe in the principle of non-interference by this country in the internal
affairs of other nations and that we should stand steadfastly against any such
interference by whomsoever it may be urged.
And I believe in the common brotherhood of man under the common father-
hood of God.
Where is there a nation which is controlled by the Catholic
Church that has laws such as ours? Where is there a Catholic King,
President, Emperor, or any ruler whose creed is similar to the one Al
THE AL SMITH LETTER 167
Smith would have you believe is his? The Pope of Rome does not
advocate such a creed, Catholicism does not teach such a creed and no
subject of the Pope of Rome and no advocate of Catholicism could be
a believer in such a creed.
Gov. Smith's views do not coincide with the teachings of his
church nor do thej^ agree with the views of any of the high lights in
the Catholic church.
Let us give a few quotations from the CREEDS of other Catholics
as given by Sen. Tom Heflin in his reply to Smith's letter.
"I admit the Pope can absolve Catholics from allegiance to the form of
government under which they reside." — Priest McDermott, in a sermon in Phila-
delphia, April 15, 1894.
"The will of the Pope is the supreme law of all lands." — Archbishop John
Ireland, St. Paul, Minn.
"In 1857 the Pope declared the laws of Mexico as not binding, and the
citizens be absolved from all obedience to the ruler of the country." — Paris dis-
patch in the Birmingham (Ala.) Age-Herald, March 28, 1915.
"Tell us we are Catholics first and Americans or Englishmen afterwards; of
course we are. Tell us in the conflict between the church and the civil govern-
ment we take the side of the church; of course we do. Why, if the Govern-
ment of the United States were at war with the church, we would say tomorrow,
To hell with the Government of the United States; and if the church and all the
governments of the world were at war, we would say. To hell with all the govern-
ments of the world. * * * * Why is it that in this country, where we have only
7 per cent of the population, the Catholic Church is so much feared? She is
loved by all her children and feared by everybody. Why is it the Pope has such
tremendous power? Why, the Pope is the ruler of the world. All the emperors,
all the kings, all the princes, all the presidents of the world are as these altar
boys of mine. The Pope is the ruler of the world." — Priest Phelan in Westei-n
Watchman, June 27, 1912.
"* * * If the American Republic is to be sustained and preserved at all, it
must be by the rejection of the principles of the reformation (church and state
separation) and the acceptance of the Catholic principle by the American people."
— See The Papacy and the Civil Power, pp. 172, 173.
"All Catholics should exert their power to cause the constitutions of the
States to be modeled to the principles of their church." — Pope Leo XIII, Novem-
ber 7, 1890.
"When a Catholic candidate is on the ticket and the opponent is a non-
Catholic, let the Catholic candidate have the vote, no matter what he repre-
sents." — Catholic Review, July, 1894.
"A preist cannot be forced to give testimony before a secular judge." —
Taberna, a papal theologian. Vol. 2, p. 277.
"The Roman Catholic citizens of the United States owe no allegiance to any
principles of the government which are condemned by the pope." — The Tablet
(R. C).
"Undubtedly it is the intention of the pope to possess this country. In this
168 THE WATSONIAN
intention, he is aided by the Jesuits and all the Catholic prelates and priests." —
Dr. O. A. Bronson, Catholic writer.
"Many non-Catholics fear us as a political organization and are afraid that
the Catholic Church will dominate and rule; we are working quietly, seriously,
and I may say effectively, to that end." — June Number, 1909, of The Missionary
(R. C), p. 26.
"Let the public-school system go to where it came from, the devil." — Free-
man's Journal, November 16, 1869.
"It will be a glorious day in this country when, under the laws, the school
system will be shivered to pieces." — Catholic Telegrapht.
"We would rather our children should grow up in ignorance of letters than
be taught in a school that is not Catholic." — Catholic Review.
"I do not consider that we are doing our duty as American citizens, to our-
selves, or to our children in permiting such a system of public schools to exist
as we have today." — Professor Dunne, of the Jesuit College, Washington, D. C.
The vast amount of space which has been given to the Smith
Creed by the American press and the almost solid editorial endorse-
ment of it should awaken the non-Catholic American citizens to the
sense of danger we are facing today. The time has come to fight for
American ideals and principles with the same patriotism that our
forefathers fought in establishing this country. The issue is the same.
Will we submit and bow to a movement which will result in placing
this country direct under the Pope of Rome or will we fight as never
before to forever guarantee our descendants the same American
liberties that our progenitors handed down to us ?
169
Break Away From Party Bondage
By THOS. E. WATSON
Have we a greater man than
John Wesley?
He struggled with might and
main, — ^from the time he was an
Oxford College boy until the
snows of eighty-one years rested
upon his noble head, — to get re-
form inside the Episcopal Church.
His failure to do so was hope-
lessly complete.
Then, at last, he gave up his
lifelong effort to do the impossi-
ble, and set up an independent
Methodist Church.
Yet you Democrats keep on
yawping "Let us get Reform in-
side the Democratic Party."
And you Republicans, who are
at heart in rebellion against the
infamous regime of the Stand-
patters, continue to prate, "Let
us get Reform inside the Repub-
lican Party."
* * *
John Huss sought Reform in-
side the Church, — and lost his
life, without bringing about any
reforms.
Similar was the fate of Savon-
arola.
But Luther went outside the
Church, and set up an indepen-
dent movement. Thus he not only
established a purer and diviner
worship, but compelled the Cath-
olic Church to purge itself and
lead a better life.
* * *
In France, all the efforts of the
great statesman Turgot to work
out Reform from within met with
failure. Futile, likewise, were the
utmost efforts of Necker.
Reform had to come from with-
out. So case-hardened were the
pets of Special Privilege, — lay and
clerical, — that it took the lighting
of Revolution to level the walls of
Caste.
* * *
In England it was the Inde-
pendent movement of Richard
Cobden and John Bright that
struck down the Corn Laws, and
gave to Great Britain the Free-
dom of Trade which has made her
the Commercial Mistress of the
world.
* * *
Reform inside either of the
corrupt, class-ridden parties is a
self-evident absurdity.
Jefferson smashed the semi-
royalism of the Federalists with
an Independent Movement.
Jackson dethroned King Caucus
and the rule of the Bank Ring by
organizing a break-away appeal
to the masses.
If we ever wring equal rights
for all out of the greedy clutches
of the exploiters of Special Priv-
ilege, we've got to have a common
ground upon which the Reform-
ers of all parties can come to-
gether.
And that makes necessary an
Independent movement of some
kind.
— Jeffersonian Magazine, 1907.
170
FROM THE PRESS
ENTITLED TO BETTER
If, as America's leading philosopher said, a man is entitled in life to be
seen at his best, cei'tainly the mantle of charity should cover him beyond the hour
of his death. It is in defense of that belief and not in defense of Thomas E.
Watson, whom it never followed in life, but whose genius The Telegraph recog-
nized, that this is written.
Watson deserves to be seen in a much better light than the present "Wat-
sonian" shows him. That new magazine, which appears without the name of
its foundei's at its masthead, intends, apparently, to derive the greater portion
of its clientele from those who admired and followed Mr. Watson in life and
who may have that natural desire to read again from his pen in a re-publication
of the things he wrote. The first few issues of the Watsonian have reproduced
articles he wrote during his early life. The selection has been bad. Mr. Wat-
son is revealed in them not as the brilliant orator who swayed crowds — that he
did, thousands now living in Georgia can testify; not as a hard fighter, but in the
ill-fitting clothes of a Chesterfield, writing a book of etiquette for young gentle-
men. The role does not fit him.
It is reasonable to believe that other articles as badly chosen will be published
in the magazine. Were he living, Mr. Watson himself would no doubt protest.
No man who writes daily, much less anj'^ man who wrote as much as Mr. Wat-
son, writes uniformly well. He writes much chaff and chatter, much space-filling
stuff that he is ashamed of. To have published it once was agony enough for
him; to have it dug up and re-published is enough to make him seek the nearest
river and its surcease, were he living. A Georgia editor who leaped into national
renown because of an editorial he wrote, remarked afterward to a friend that
he was heartily ashamed of it because it was the most maudlin thing he ever
wrote. Yet, it plagued him to the day of his death that his fame was based upon
that. So with Mr. Watson. His fame did not rest upon such trashy stuff as his
advice to young gentlemen about observing the ordinary sanitary amenities of
civilization, which now appear coarse and uncouth. If he were alive, it is prob-
able that his face would become as red as his hair was in his greatest days as a
fighter — red from blushes because of what his friends are doing to him.
Were his memory left alone, his powers of oratory and appeal would be-
come, in the course of time, legendary. In a great distant day some materialist
biographer might subject him to critical analysis, and he might become more
human and legg of a demi-god, but his friends ai*e saving the biographers that
trouble. — Macon Telegraph, April 13th, 1927.
Ed. Note : It seems that the Macon Telegraph is very much dis-
couraged relative to our collection of articles for The Watsonian.
Being in this state of disturbance they almost said one nice thing
about Thomas E. Watson in the above article.
They say that they believe the man is entitled to be seen at his
best. If the Telegraph is sincere in this belief why did they print
less than two months ago on their editorial page the following:
FROM THE PRESS 171
He had just dragged through the United States Senate the most appalling
mass of unfounded charges that ever made a constituency blush for its repre-
sentative. Tom Watson's conspicuous war service was in the encouragement of
slackerism. His most characteristic "issue"" was his hatred of the Roman Catholic
church and his charges against it and its people. That is where Tom Watson left
off in the venomous dotage of a spectacular life. There is nothing in that
truncated career to provoke any thoughtful Georgian to wish for any one to
fulfill his ambitions.
The Telegraph thinks that Mr. Watson could be shown in a better
light than we are showing him. Then why do they publish such false-
hoods as the above about him?
We believe you call this hypocrisy.
If Mr. Watson were alive to read the above item from the Macon
Telegraph we feel sure his face would turn red, not by blushing, but
with anger. Although the anger would soon pass away and he would
realize that he could expect nothing else from a newspaper whose
editor he had accused of obtaining his paper by unfair methods and
dared him to sue him for libel.
Now as to the selection of articles in The Watsonian, we have
only this to say. The major part of the articles printed thus far in
The Watsonian are from Mr. Watson's Prose Miscellanies. This book
is regarded as the cream of Mr. Watson's literary writings. The
articles speak for themselves.
There is one "article," however, which is not in Prose Miscellanies.
That is the Roman Catholic Hierarchy. This article possibly disturbs
the Telegraph also, as it gives information which shows that their
policy in advocating Al Smith for President is un-American, yes, and
encourages "slackerism" much more than Mr. Watson's editorials on
the war. In fact, most of Mr. Watson's opinions about the war issue
have been declared sound. (Does the Telegraph believe that the
people of Georgia would send a slacker to the United States Senate?)
And if such papers as the Telegraph pulls the wool over the eyes of
the American people and allows a Catholic to get in the White House
they, the American people, will, in our opinion, declare Watson's edi-
torials relative to Catholicism very sound.
The Watsonian would not be appreciated unless we expressed our
appreciation to the Telegraph for the free advertisement they have
given us by their three articles attacking our magazine, but in thank-
ing them for their generosity we would also like to state that when
we need help in selecting "articles" by Mr. Watson for The Watsonian
we will go to his friends and not such bitter, rank enemies as the
Macon Telegraph.
172
LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE
BEST HISTORIAN:
The Tom Watson Book Company,
Dear Friends:
Draft for $1.00 enclosed for The
Watsonian. I am 79 years old and an
old Tom Watson Reader. I consider
Watson the finest man ever produced
and the best historian of his time.
O. B. WEBSTER.
Emerson, Nebraska.
4c 4c >|t H: %
HERE'S MY DOLLAR:
The Watsonian,
Thomson, Ga.
Dear Friends:
Sure, here's my dollar. I don't need
any sample copy, I know what it must
be right now.
I sat down and cried when the news
came to me that Tom Watson was gone.
May God Almighty prosper you in
the greatest work on earth, so that —
"Thy Kingdom may come and thy will
be done on earth as it is in Heaven."
Yours,
T. S. MATTHEWS.
Vandalia, Missouri.
*****
HOPE WATSON READERS DITTO:
Dear Friend:
Your card at hand and I am glad to
hear from some of the Watson family.
I sure missed the Watson papers and
magazines so enclosed you will find post
office money order for $1.00.
Hoping you will have good luck and
hoping all the old Watson readers do
the same as I have.
Yours respectfully,
P. J. BURGER.
Hamilton, Missouri.
A PLEASURE:
Publishers of The Watsonian,
Thomson, Georgia.
Gentlemen:
I enclose herewith $1.00 as per en-
closed card for one year's subscription
to The Watsonian.
This is a pleasure I long have waited
for.
Yours truly,
JOHN HARKNESS.
Burlingame, Kans.
*****
A GREAT MAN PASSED:
The Watsonian:
Enclosed find $1.00 for which send me
The Watsonian. I have been a great
admirer of Thomas E. Watson and his
writings. Was a subscriber to The
Jeffersonian and Watson's magazine.
Also to the Sentinel during the entire
time he was connected with it. When
he died a great man passed away.
Yours truly,
C. W. SLEEPER.
Millport, N. Y.
*****
AMERICA'S MASTER:
Miss Georgia Watson Lee,
Thomson, Georgia.
Dear Georgia:
I can only think of you, as the little
girl I knew in the long years ago, so
you must pardon what seems, since
you are the full grown girl, — ^familiari-
ty.
Your recent letter in reply to mine
was far more than mere delight; it took
me back to those times in my life that
surround your old home. Hickory Hill,
and that he, dead to us, yet whose life
LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE
173
and memories make living worth the
day. Yawning despair engulfs me,
mockeries of the past loom, to enshroud
all I once so fondly hoped should live
forever, when I go back to the days
spent at Thomson, Hickory Hill, and the
home so dear, — He is there no more, —
the trees, the birds, the djring leaves,
the winding path, the hallowed radi-
ance, that his presence gave is forever
gone; I must live out this life to my
grave, but Georgia, forgive me when I
tell you I can never more find time or
heart to face those scenes again,— I
must live out the years that arc mine,
thinking only of Hickory Hill and
America's Master, who once lived there,
— ^to me HE must be there forever. Yes
HE is there, and to me you shall be
the living HIM, and we must carry on.
I wish that I had a handful of your
little books, I need them tonight, — the
mail today did not bring them, get them
to me as soon as possible. I have sev-
eral thousand REAL MEN,— whose
brain and brawn beat as true as steel
to HIS ideals, and so must to yours;
they will respond.
Many were the time, when HE used
to write me and say "let not the dis-
appointments of today mar the coming
of tomorrow, it too often has been my
fate, but Don, go on."
Your most sincerely,
DON H. CLARK.
Savannah, Ga.
could obtain some of the writings of the
late Senator Watson, but without suc-
cess, and I had concluded there was no
chance when I received your welcome
card.
I was a steady reader of T. E. W.'s
publications ever since I first procured
a copy of the Jeffersonian in Los An-
geles, Calif., in 1914. I was greatly
shocked and saddened to hear of his un-
timely death at a time when he was
showing how a genuine Jefifersonian
Democrat could fight when he had el-
bow room. I have always been an ar-
dent admirer of Senator Watson and
the ideals he espoused.
I have often wondered whether or not
Mr. Watson ever had a phonographic
record of his voice made. If so, where
could I obtain a record? I have the
song by Vernon Dalhart. I play it
often; not so much for the words or for
the music but in honor of a great and
noble man.
I am enclosing the card for a sample
copy of the Watsonian. I shall sub-
scribe for the magazine in the near fu-
ture. Also kindly send me a list of
books by Thos. E. Watson and oblige.
Yours truly,
F. W. McDANIEL.
Peoria, Illinois.
Ed. Note: We are sorry to ad-
vise that Mr. Watson never re-
corded his voice.
GENUINE JEFFERSONIAN:
Peoria, Ills., March 24, 1927.
The Watsonian,
Thomson, Georgia.
Dear Editor:
I was greatly surprised and more
than pleased to receive your card an-
nouncing the publication of THE
WATSONIAN. I have been endeavor-
ing for some time to find out where I
GREATEST STATESMAN:
Miss Georgia Watson Lee,
Thomson, Georgia.
Dear Miss Lee:
I am so glad to get your card. I am
also glad to know that Mr. Watson has
left a descendant to take up his work.
I think your grandfather was one of the
greatest statesmen America ever pro-
duced. We miss him so much and we
174
THE WATSONIAN
need him so badly at this time to help
fight the Hierarchy.
Yours truly,
T. F. HUGHES, SR.
Okoloma, Arkansas.
:je 3|e :4c :}c :*:
GKEAT AND NOBLE:
The Watsonian,
Thomson, Ga.
Dear Friends:
1 loved and admired Thos. E. Watson.
He was an unusually great and noble
man. His influence lives on.
I am a native of old Georgia and
proud of it.
Respectfully,
B. P. MOODY.
Detroit, Texas.
*****
CONTENDED FOR THE TRUTH:
The Watsonian,
Thomson, Georgia.
Dear Friends:
Your card to hand and enclosed you
will find stamp for which please mail
me a sample copy of your magazine.
I am glad you are trying to keep
alive that for which T. E. Watson con-
tended. I regretted so much his death,
we need him so much to contend for the
truth.
Yours truly,
L .R. SAMS.
Tipton, Oklahoma.
*****
APPRECIATES THE OPPORTUNITY:
The Watsonian,
Thomson, Georgia.
Dear Friends:
I am in receipt of your card calling
attention to the writings of the late
Tom Watson. I sincerely thank you
for this notice. I am enclosing the card
and a stamp for a sample copy of The
Watsonian. I am a great admirer of
the late Tom Watson and sui'e will ap-
preciate the opportunity to read any of
his writings. Very truly,
E. A. ARMSTRONG.
Guthrie Center, Iowa.
*****
BANKING:
The Watsonian,
Thomson, Georgia.
Dear Sirs:
I have read the first number of The
Watsonian with much pleasure and do
not doubt that it will come up to the
Watson standard as near as humanly
possible. I think he was the greatest
all round publicist of his time. His
publications were valuable to me par-
ticularly because of the light they shed
on finance banking and currency. Now
that the bank power has succeeded in
fastening the Federal Reserve Bank-
ing system (the European system) it
seems to me the republic has been over-
thrown and the President, whoever he
may be, made virtual king.
Yours truly,
S. A. BLACKSTONE.
Chester, N. H.
*****
25 YEARS AHEAD:
The Watsonian,
Thomson, Ga.
Gentlemen:
Please find enclosed my check for
$1.00. Please send The Watsonian to
C. H. Carter, Philadelphia, Miss. He is
my father and is of Georgia birth; he is
now a little over 79 years of age and
ha3 been a reader of the Watson pub-
lications ever since the days of the
Fai'mers' Alliance. I also have read
most of them. Mr. Watson did a great
work and his name will be honored yet
more and more as the people see as he
saw 2.5 years ago.
With best wishes for The Watsonian,
I am, Yours truly,
J. M. CARTER.
Philadelphia, Miss.
175
**• •*•
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Y V
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J Important notice : Any of the Watson books may be ob- J*
I tained free as a premium for subscribers to The Watson- ♦
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I our circulation for The Watsonian but to give all an op- j*
% portunity to obtain some of the best writings in Ameri- ±
t can literature.
t This Offer Is Only Good for the Month of May Unless Further
I
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J: Handbook of Politics and Economics 1.50 |
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t Socialist and Socialism 1.00 ;!;
I (Premium 3 Watsonian Subscriptions) :|
:»: Series seven Booklets, Make America Catholic. 1.00 I
% (Premium 3 Watsonian Subscriptions) I
I Series three booklets, Watson on the War .50 t
t (Premium 2 Watsonian Subscriptions) t
I
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I Ancient Civilization .50 |
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'^ Story of France (2 volumes — new edition) 6.25 |
(Premium 10 Watsonian Subscriptions)
Life and Times of Thomas Jefferson (new
edition) 3.25
Napoleon (new edition) 3.75
(Premium 7 Watsonian Subscriptions)
An Excellent Opportunity
THE TOM WATSON BOOK CO., Inc.
Thomson, Ga.
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176
The WATSONIAN
DEDICATED
To The Ideals Espoused
By
THOMAS E. WATSON
In an effort to build a monument to the late Senator
Thomas E. Watson in the form of a monthly magazine
we offer you "The Watsonian."
Its policy always will be to advocate Jeffersonian and
Watsonian principles ; "equal rights to all — special priv-
ileges to none ; "fight for America and Americans against
un-American subjects.
Anyone interested in such policies will find The Wat-
sonian an interesting publication.
Sample copies mailed free to names submitted to us.
Tom Watson books given free as premiums to anyone j
sending in subscription clubs. !
OUR GOAL 100,000 READERS BY NEXT PRESIDEN-
TIAL ELECTION.
i The WATSONIAN i
THOMSON, GEORGIA
I
■■i^>'^^%&^^
Senator Watson was a pioneer in every struggle in recent years that
has brought relief to the masses of mankind. He was of heroic mold. He
lived and died for the uplift of his fellows. His great learning, his
masterly oratorical gift, his rare courage, lofty patriotism, and labor for
the common good give him place as one of the outstanding statesmen of
our great Republic.
It is not gold, but only men
Can make a people great and strong.
Men who, for truth and honor's sake,
Stand fast and suffer long;
Brave men who work while others sleep.
Who dare while other fly,
These build a nation's pillars deep
And lift them to the sky.
— From House Memorial Services to Thos, E. Watson,
Representative Steagall of Alabama.